Those Who Don't Mind
by TriedItAtHome
Summary: "So what if I'd been watching him? It's not as as if it's a big deal, anyway, or at least not as big a deal as he, who has apparently noticed, decides to make it out to be. After all, we've been friends for a long time now, ever since I can really remember, so why should it be such a big deal if I've been watching him?" Specs/Romeo, and Davey, for some reason, is great with advice.


So what if I'd been watching him? It's not as as if it's a big deal, anyway, or at least not as big a deal as he, who has apparently noticed, decides to make it out to be. After all, we've been friends for a long time now, ever since I can really remember, so why should it be such a big deal if I've been watching him?

"What'cha lookin' at, Specs? Seeing something you like?"

I must turn beet-red, because Romeo falls into fits of giggles - rather like a five-year-old, might I add - and I try to hide my face behind my screen. It doesn't work. I want to say something witty and sarcastic back, but it's never really been my strong suit, unlike Romeo who can have anybody stuttering and spluttering and struggling to find words in a matter of seconds. It's embarrassing.

So, instead I end up blurting out, "Since when did I ever consent to you calling me 'Specs'?"

"Since never," he says without looking at me, though I'm unable to _not_ stare at him. "But you really have no choice." It's true. "And why would it come up now? I've been calling you that forever." Also true. "Plus, I've got a nickname that's never goin' away, and so does everybody else. And be thankful you got one of the good ones. I mean, who's that new kid?"

"Snoddy? The freshman, Skittery's brother?"

"Yeah. I mean, _Snoddy_? _Really?! _Seriously, who came up with that?"

"Skittery, I believe."

"And here's why I've never wanted an older brother."

I sigh, still having not stopped watching him. Again. He's sprawled across my bed - it seems he can't be anywhere without sprawling, as though it's just in his nature to take up as much space as possible - complete with book, supposed to be read but clearly not, fanned open on his stomach and my hairy fluffball of a dog pressed up against his leg. The two have been inseparable ever since Romeo helped me pick him out from the pound three years ago, when he was nothing more than walking fluff with eyes. Both of us often joke that Tigger really belongs to Romeo even if he sleeps and eats in my house.

"Hey, gorgeous," he says, and it takes me a full three seconds of wishful thinking and slight confusion to realize that he's only saying it to get my attention. I've spaced out. Again.

"What, Romeo?"

"Shouldn't I be asking you? You've been staring forever. Anything wrong?"

I shake my head and finally pry my eyes away from him and back to the half-written document in front of me. "Just thinking about this essay. You know I space out when I think."

He rolls his eyes, takes his book and chucks it at my head with an easy flick of his wrist. I dodge it, and it slams into the wall behind my desk before dropping heavily to the ground.

"Okay. Whatever you say."

I go back to typing nonsensical words about the effects a part-time job have on the functionality of a high school student's mind and he goes back to absently drawing circles behind Tigger's ear, and it seems they're both beginning to fall asleep.

That is, until ten minutes later and my essay's almost done that he speaks and I realize he - Romeo, not Tigger - has been very much awake all this time. His voice is soft, but his words might as well be spoken through a bullhorn through the easy, comfortable silence we've settled into.

"I think I'm bi."

"Jesus Christ, Romeo! I thought you were sleeping." He doesn't say anything, and his words sink in. "Oh. Should that… It doesn't matter to me, if that's what you were worried about. You're still you. It doesn't change anything."

And for one, I actually somehow manage to keep my voice sounding nonchalant because of fucking _course _it changes things. It changes _everything_.

"You mean it?"

He sounds so much happier now, so relieved. How can I possibly go back on my word, tell him otherwise?

"Of course I mean it. You're my best friend."

He sits up now, whips my pillow from behind his head and onto his lap, puts his chin in his hands and his elbows on the pillow. Tigger doesn't stir, and he's absolutely beaming. I roll my chair around to the middle of the room so that we can talk without a laptop and a desk between us.

"So I don't know whether to ask 'since when' or 'who'."

"Does it sound too corny to say they go hand-in-hand?"

"Yes."

"But it's true. I mean, I still like girls, of course I still like girls, but he's a really sweet guy, and super smart and pretty all-out gay, too."

"Do I know him?" Maybe it sounds a little too hopeful in my head, but he doesn't see it that way and that's all that matters.

"Is there anybody I know that you don't?" I give him a pointed look, and he sighs and if my eyes stray for a second longer than they should on the pout his lips make when he does, I will first fiercely deny it then ignore that it ever happened. "Yeah, yeah okay. But I swear to God if you tell him I will cut you up and force you to eat your own intestines."

"Ew! Romeo, what the hell?"

"This is that serious, Specs! I can't tell anybody else but you, and therefore you can't tell anybody else but you."

"Can I tell the dog? I'm sure Tigger will want to be in the loop when he wakes up again."

"Fine, but only the dog." He takes a breath, and it occurs to me here that we're both being absolute girls about this whole thing. Then the thought flutters away just as quickly as it came because he says, "It's Mush" and maybe a little part of me dies inside and I'm not sure why.

My stomach drops like it's an elevator cut loose of it's cables, a whole forty-seven floors, it seems. My eyes widen, my mouth opens, my head starts to hurt. My gut twists and turns and begs me to just lay on the floor and turn to dust. It, or something, obviously shows on my face because Romeo says my name and waves an arm in front of my face. I don't respond.

He likes - loves, maybe - Mush Meyers, or whatever the hell his real name is. He's been Mush for so long I'm not sure even _he _remembers. But the fact remains, real name or not, that Romeo is in love with him and something about that bothers me to the point where all I want is to make my best friend get out of my house and curl up with a gallon of ice cream and eat until I manage to kill myself with it.

He says my name three times before I snap out of it.

"Yeah, sorry. Mush, huh? I hate to break it to you, but you're going to have to go through Kid Blink like a bull to get to him. Multiple times."

He sighs and flops back onto my other pillows once again. "I _know_ but I never said I wanted to date him, did I? I just said it was a little crush."

"Well, if it's made you realize you're bi, then it's got to be more than a _little_ crush, doesn't it?"

He shrugs helplessly from his awkward position on my bed, though it's clearly not awkward enough to bother him into moving. Tigger still hasn't woken, I note.

"Okay, so more than a _little _crush, but, like you say, there's Kid Blink and I'm totally rooting for those two. It's like every time they even stand in the same room I just want to bash their heads together. Seems like the only thing that would make them a little less clueless, huh?"

_You, you. You're the clueless one_, a little voice in my head says. I don't know if it's talking to me or to Romeo. Or to both. None of these options helps headache or my elevator-dropping stomach (who knew it could just drop over and over again like this?) or my twisting gut or my need for death by ice cream.

"Still, this opens up the whole other fifty percent of the earth's population to me!"

"The whole other fifty percent that's old enough for you."

"Oh, details." He draws more circles behind Tigger's ears. "But this really doesn't change anything? You won't think of me any differently now?"

I put on a tight smile that actually, I think, looks very, very convincing. "Of course not. You know I'd back you up for anything." Neither of us comment on my choice of words, and I have my doubts that he really even notices. "The only thing it changes is now I have the option of setting you up with guys, too."

He laughs - it's much more genuine than mine is. "Didn't we already establish that anybody you know I do, too?"

"That doesn't mean I can't still try to set you up."

Every word I speak to him the rest of the night cause me actual, physical pain. Every look I spare him makes my eyes burn with tears and a lump build in my throat. So I don't say much and I try not to look at him, but it proves incredibly challenging and I still haven't completely allowed myself to answer the _why, why, why?_ chant that my brain has going for me.

He leaves not long after the way he always leaves: a long, heartfelt goodbye to Tigger, who finally awakens, a short and not-so-heartfelt goodbye to me, climbs out my window and down the big-ass Magnolia tree that's been growing there since before I was born and before my parents even bought the house. I watch him carefully from my window as he sticks his hands in his pockets and makes his way down the street, kicking rocks as he goes.

I've finished my essay - I never claim it to be a great one, considering, and in my head I dare anyone to call me out on it and see just what I think of that, though I know that's stupid - and I do the only thing I can think to do. I call Davey. And I tell him everything. Because if I'm told not to tell something to anyone, Davey doesn't count, even if we're not best friends because Davey can keep a secret better than anyone and Davey always knows what to do.

"Specs, I hate to say it."

"Never start a sentence like that, Davey, because then you shouldn't be saying it."

"I hate to say it, but I think you're gay."

"I'm…" What? Not gay? The stomach drop and the headache and the twisting gut and my need for death-by-gallon-of-ice-cream weren't jealousy at the fact that it was Mush and not me? Mush who made my best friend realize he was bi, realize he could, potentially love me. Mush, who's _not me_? I haven't given any girl a sideways glance in months, maybe years, and maybe it's not that I'm more into boys but that I've been tired, busy, uninterested… Not tired. Not busy, I realize. Just uninterested. So, then what? _I'm not gay?_ "I hate you."

"Okay, but it doesn't change the fact. I mean, we've all known for ages that you wouldn't know it if it broke your nose. You can be pretty dense sometimes, I mean, and so it makes sense that it took all that time for you to figure it out."

"'All that time'? 'We've all known'?" I sigh. He doesn't need to explain, I get the picture. "You've been spending too much time with Jack. You sound more and more like him every day."

That's the first time I hear him swear, then he rapidly changes the subject. "You finish that essay yet?"

"Yeah." I don't tell him it's not too promising and instead switch the subject back two paces. "Davey, I don't know what to do."

I sound whiny, child-like, but I don't even care and I don't have to worry about Davey caring because he's Davey and that's what he's here for.

"I hate to say it -"

"_Davey!_"

"- but the best advice I can give you is to tell him."

"Tell him what? That I love him or that I'm gay?" We both stop and I think I'm aware that we both inhale sharply, but it could just be my over-caffeination, sleep-deprivation and all around confusion about everything that's happened to me in the past hour. "Shit."

"I suggest the gay part, first. I don't know him all too well, but I'd say he'll take that better than that you love him. But, like I say. I don't know."

I move to my bed, lay down and press the heel of my hand hard into my eye, until I see stars, but I don't take it away.

"Fuck. I don't know. I didn't mean to say it."

"But did you mean it?"

"I don't know. No. Maybe. Yes."

I hear him chuckle over the line. "Specs, I can't help you if you don't know which it is."

"I guess so."

"So maybe, then."

"I guess."

"Right," he sighs. "Listen, all I can tell you is to talk to him. It sounds like a total chick-flick thing, I know, but you've got to do it. If you love him, then it's a start, right? Maybe it'll make you feel a little better."

"What if it doesn't? What if it just makes me feel worse knowing that he knows that I could possibly like him, and knowing that I know that I love him but can't because he won't love me back? I was miserable as hell when he told me, so why shouldn't he be if I tell him?"

"I… I actually understood that. Okay, wow. No, no, Specs, you've got it all wrong! You're not mad at him for being bi, you're upset that it took Mush for him to realize it. So why would he be miserable if you told him you were gay? It would be a tad bit hypocritical of him, wouldn't it?"

I hum in begrudging agreement, unwilling to say anything.

He sighs again, and if I wasn't so down, I would have asked him what was wrong. If I wasn't so down, I might have guessed that it had something to do with Jack.

"Listen, Specs, I can't tell you what to do, but I can try to help, okay? And I think that telling him you're gay will help. I think it will make you feel better, and if it doesn't you have every right to tell me 'I told you so' and make me pay for all the cookie dough ice cream you want. Got it?"

"Will you come over here and drown yourself in all that cookie dough ice cream with me _when_ that happens?"

Another sigh. "_If _that happens," he corrects.

"Why are you sighing so much?"

"Because you're being stubborn it makes my brain hurt."

"Everything makes your brain hurt. Especially Jack."

I can practically hear his blush, but he, as always, avoids the subject. "I am only trying to help you, Specs. I don't need to deal with this."

"Okay, well thanks, Davey. Be expecting a call to take you up on that ice cream deal."

"Yeah, yeah. Bye, Specs."

I toss my phone onto the bed close to my hip. Tigger jumps up with me now that I'm done talking, and pushes his head into my neck, flops himself down on top of my arm and halfway across my body in a way that reminds me so much of Romeo and his sprawling that it hurts. One half of me is overheating where Tigger stretches across it and half is freezing.

The house's heater isn't on again.

I roll over as best I can and envelop my dog in a sort-of hug, eventually giving in to the part of my brain that urges me to imagine that it's a certain snarky, newly-bisexual, dark-haired, gorgeous boy in my arms and not a shaggy German Shepherd mutt in desperate need of a bath.

# # #

I lay awake for hours with Tigger, who eventually cuts off circulation to my arm and makes it tingle - where I can feel it still - before I worm around enough to kick my phone up to where I can reach it with my free arm.

My ringer was off. Two voicemails and a text message.

The first voicemail is from Mom.

_Hi, honey. I know it's late again, I'm sorry, but I had to work the night shift. I won't get home until early tomorrow, probably not early enough to take you to school so you'll have to ask your father. Oh, and if you haven't noticed, the heater's broken. We'll have to call someone in to fix it, so sorry 'bout that. Okay, well, goodnight, honey! Get lots of sleep and good luck at school tomorrow._

The second's from Dad.

_Hey. I'll be home around midnight. Your mom's not going to be home, if she hasn't already told you, so I'll take you to school tomorrow, but I think you'll have to walk to rehearsal afterwards. I've got a meeting I can't miss. Goodnight._

The message is from Romeo.

**Davey said u had 2 tell me smth?**

I let out a low growl that causes Tigger to briefly raise his head and send me a half-hearted glare before laying back down once more and falling quickly into snores and running dreams.

I send a message to Davey and tell him I'm going to kill him (he sends a wink-face back) before responding to Romeo.

**since u told me ur bi and i trust u, i figure i should tell u im gay**

Then I follow it up with:

**that sounded less corny + dramatic in my head**

He doesn't respond for a moment, I don't even see the little icon that normally appears in the bottom corner to show he's typing. Then my screen lights up with CALL FROM: ROMEO, and I think for the first time that maybe it's a little strange that he's in my contacts as his nickname. I'm reassured by remembering that he was the one who put it in that way.

I SLIDE TO ANSWER and don't get out more than half a breath before his voice fills my ear.

"So you had to get Davey to tell me to tell you to tell me?"

"I guess."

"Why?"

"Cause I'm a stupid, stubborn ass who didn't want to ruin your big reveal."

"Who cares about my big reveal? Specs, you've finally figured it out!"

I groan, knowing exactly what he's talking about, just exactly as I hadn't had to ask Davey what he meant by 'all that time' and 'we've all known'. "You mean you knew, too? Did everybody know that I was gay for months before I did?"

"Try years, man."

I groan again. "That doesn't even make any sense."

"Sure it does. You were too much of a… stupid, stubborn ass to admit it to yourself for however long, not even if it broke your nose."

"Is that some saying you and the guys have, that I wouldn't know it if it broke my nose cause that's twice I've heard it now."

He pauses and I know he's lying. "No. Hey, why did you call Davey in the first place?"

"Questions about the essay. That somehow turned into a conversation about me being gay."

"So why did he say you had to tell _me_?"

I struggle for a moment to find an answer that makes any logical sense and will make him even remotely believe me. Romeo's like a human bullshit detector.

"You're my best friend. I guess he thought it would be good if you knew."

"_He _thought, huh?"

"No, Romeo, that's not what I meant! I meant he knew I was going to a stupid, stubborn ass and not tell you because that's just how I am, so he just took it into his own hands." _And I'm going to fucking kill him for it._

Just static floats over the line between us.

"Romeo?"

"It's okay. I get it. I'm sorry."

"You've got nothing to be sorry for."

"Okay, well, thanks for telling me. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"See you tomorrow."

And if I curl back up with Tigger and don't think twice about letting myself imagine it's Romeo there instead that I hold onto and cry into for the first time in six years, that's okay. It's not as if it's a big deal, anyways.

# # #

I manage to avoid him most of the week, which makes me both happy and mad. He could come say something to me. He could come and fix this. He started it in the first place.

But that's stupid. Of course it's stupid, of course he didn't start this. We both started this, and Mush started this, and Kid Blink and Davey and society. Everybody started it and so I have every right to be angry with the world for no good reason.

But he could still come and fix this.

Everybody else notices, because who wouldn't? I know we're always joined at the hip, almost never leave each other's sides, so then all of the sudden we come in Monday and act like arch-enemies. But nobody says anything, as is probably the wisest thing to do.

It's Thursday when I speak to him again.

Morris Delancey, your regular dick-faced high school rich kid, and his sidekick brother Oscar 'just so happen' to bump into him in the hallway. His books fall all over the floor and some poor freshman trips over one, tumbles to the floor. So does Romeo. He hauls himself up slowly, like he's preparing for a draw he knows he doesn't stand a chance of winning.

"Sorry, Shakespeare. Didn't see ya there."

Romeo doesn't respond, just bends to pick up his books and scattered papers. The freshman helps for about two seconds before catching the brothers' hard stares, turns, and bolts. It's so unlike Romeo to not stand up to the two, defend himself if not have a little fun with his offenders, and it catches me so off-guard when he doesn't that I have to take a step back and blink a few times, just to comprehend what I'm seeing.

He doesn't wear his usual smile, his arms seem weak when he stands up with his books held close to his chest, his back stooped as though they're such a great burden.

"What's the matter? Feelin' out of it today, little half-dyke? Yeah, heard all about the sudden change in interest, there."

I surge forward almost unwillingly and unknowingly, at Romeo's side with my arm around his shoulders so easily it feels natural. Like it just fit there. (Like we fit together.)

"We got a problem, Morris?"

Nobody's been watching until now, knowing full well that this is some serious shit if _I'm _standing up to the Delancey's, of all people. Nobody stops fully, though they slow their walking significantly and turtle-neck all down the hall.

Both brothers smirk.

"Honest mistake. See ya around, fags."

They storm off around us with mirthless laughter. My arm lingers around Romeo until he shrugs it off just as soon as he can. Nobody's watching anymore.

"Thanks, Matt," he mumbles out and storms off just as quick as the Delancey's, still stooped and no smile. I miss the bell because it takes me the whole two spare minutes I'd had to realize that A) he was talking to me and B) that was my name and finally C) he hadn't called me that since we were kids. I almost cry again, right there in the hallway.

# # #

I call Davey that night. As soon as he answers the phone I say "I told you so!" and he's on my doorstep with two tubs of cookie dough ice cream in twenty minutes flat, which is impressive, considering he lives all the way across town. We sit on my couch - my parents aren't home again - with Tigger and watch Rom-Coms all night and eat both tubs of ice cream and vow to never tell a soul about any of it. As far as we're concerned, this never happened.

"So…" he ventures after the third movie and we're nearly finished with the second tub (I'm more than a little surprised it's taken us this long).

"So. I'm gay, Romeo's bi. We're avoiding each other and I'm pretty sure he hates me even if you said he wouldn't and nobody's doing anything to fix a goddamn thing."

"I bought and brought you ice cream," he reminds me.

"I was about to say 'except for Davey, who's gotten me ice cream and is crying over chick flicks with me.'"

"Well, now you've got it covered." I turn to look at him suspiciously, then drop my head back until it hits the hard skeleton under the cushions of the couch.

"I have _got_ to get you away from Jack."

"I have _got_ to get you and Romeo together."

I practically break the remote pushing the mute button so fast. Or pause. Or something, I don't really know, but I'm not paying attention to the flatscreen anymore so it really doesn't matter what I've pressed.

"And how do you plan on doing that when -"

"When what? He's not dating Mush, he's not dating anybody. You're both avoiding each other for no reason. And, actually, it was _you _who started it."

"I did not start this! It was his decision to tell me he's bi. He didn't have to, and then things could have been normal and I could have been slightly less miserable knowing I could _never_ have him instead of knowing that I have a chance."

"See, there! You have a chance, you've just said so yourself!"

"But only because we both like guys! It's not as if there's not plenty of _that _to go around." I shoot him a pointed look and by now we're both flushed so badly we must match the crimson sofa we've made ourselves at home on.

And then we both start laughing. Slowly at first, through our noses as though we're just breathing heavily, then slow chuckles without opening our mouths until we're full on falling on top of each other and rapidly becoming lightheaded with oxygen loss.

"You're so stubborn sometimes."

"I'm stubborn all time," I say when I've more-or-less composed myself.

"Look, all you have to do is talk to him. I have no doubt that he'll listen to you and you'll figure things out. You alway do, don't you?"

I shrug. "I wouldn't know. We've never really had a big fight like this before."

He raises an eyebrow but continues to give me advice all the same. "It's so very clearly tearing both of you apart it's not funny anymore."

"It was _ever_ funny?"

"A little bit, to watch you two dance around each other. Well, dance around each other more than you normally do. But that's not the point! The point is that he won't stand up to the Delancey brothers, which he always does, and he doesn't smile anymore - neither do you, by the way - and you're here at," he checks his watch, "ten-thirty, eating ice cream and watching Rom-Coms with _me_."

"What's _that_ got to do with anything?"

"You're both stupid, stubborn asses who obviously can't see anything right in front of you and you're both in terrible states of depression because of it."

I dramatically reach down to the side of the couch and pull the handle there, making the legs flip up and the back flip down so I'm nearly laying flat. Very comfortable. I fold my fingers together and settle them on my stomach, leaning my head back and closing my eyes.

I open one eye and see Davey sitting cross-legged beside me and bent over, his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose.

"I have become a therapist. All I want is to go to law school and I have become a gay-teen-angst-bullshit therapist." He clears his throat and looks up. I open my other eye.

"You've already talked with Romeo about this, too, haven't you." It's a statement, not a question.

He doesn't say anything at first, even as I stare at him, so I snap my eyes shut again.

"The doctor is in," he says when I do.

We don't talk anymore about me and Romeo, and only a little bit about his undying love for Jack (who he can't have for reasons that begin with Katherine and end in Plumber). Most of the remainder of the night is spent with more oxygen-depriving fits of laughter and for a few hours, things start to seem a little better, make a little more sense in my head.

Davey leaves much, much later the way he always does: with a long, heartfelt and pity-filled goodbye to me (I only ever call him when I have problems, don't I?), a short but still heartfelt goodbye to Tigger, exits through my front door with a wave when he's outside as though he's not going to see me again until we're old and wrinkled and on our death beds. It's something I both love and hate about Davey.

I don't sleep, as I haven't for many of my other recent nights. Tigger doesn't stay on the bed with me, though I close him in my room anyways. He stands by the window and just looks in the direction of Romeo's house.

Even my dog is conspiring against me.

# # #

We meet eyes across room the school's Newspaper Club holds meetings in on Friday afternoons. Even if we're this mad at each other, neither of us is going to skip Newspaper Club.

Brown eyes meet blue and it's the first time this whole week I think I've actually looked at him and seen a little bit of his old self. It's just a flash, but it brings waves of joy to me just to know that he's not so angry that he can't bring himself to be Romeo anymore. But then it's gone and it's replaced for what I recognize, also for the first time this week, not as anger. He's not angry. He's sad. He's depressed. He's miserable, choking on his own cries and tears at night just as I have been.

I need to fix this, because nobody else will do anything, especially not him. For once, just this once, I'm going to get up and do something and not wait for the world to come to me. Because I've got to fix this. I can't lose Romeo.

The very thought terrifies me.

# # #

I haven't been to his house in years - he's always coming over to mine. It's changed a lot, I notice. The trees have grown up, there's flowers out front now, or the remnants of the plants in this cold January weather. Mrs. Connors had been hard at work this summer, obviously. The little vegetable garden that used to be just to the left of the front porch is now a flowerbed, but nothing grows. There's a porch swing now, too, though it and everything else is too covered in snow to see the appeal of actually having a porch swing. Or flowers.

The doorbell sound is still the same, the same one I've loved forever - it plays Ode to Joy. The beginnings of a stupid grin start to spread across my face, but halt their progress when the door opens and reveals Romeo standing there, all coffee mug and TV remote and sweatpants and no shirt and _hot damn._

We just kind of stand and gape at each other for a while before he stands aside and allows me in, setting his mug and the remote on the table next to the door. I stamp my shoes off on the mat as I enter, turn to him and find he's standing facing the now closed door, both hands on the doorknob and his head bent forward so that it almost makes contact with the frame.

"Why are you here?" he asks after a while.

I shrug even if I know he can't see it, suddenly helpless and insecure. "Because I'm an idiot who doesn't know what to make of things that are right in front of me."

He huffs in agreement and does a little tilt with his head, the kind that people make when they're nodding like 'yeah, duh, tell me something I don't know'. Then he rests it all the way against the doorframe, and neither of us dare to move, and I listen to the sounds of both our uneven ragged breaths.

"And I was jealous."

He visibly straightens.

"What?"

"I was jealous that it was Mush and not me."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" And I'm the stupid, stubborn ass.

He turns around now, finally, but his hands go behind his back in order to keep gripping tight to the doorknob. I don't really know what happens or why but all I know is that in two strides I'm so close to him that he pushes even farther up against the door, if that's possible, and it adds to his height by the tiniest bit. He's still shorter than me by a long shot. So I have to lean down to kiss him.

It's rough at first, hurried and probably not the least bit romantic. My lips are hard and cold and his are soft, even if he keeps them pressed together, and he still tastes like coffee and cream and too much sugar mixed in to be considered something manly anymore. My hands sort of end up on either side of his neck, my thumbs held still over the sharp bones of his jaw. It lasts just long enough for me to still feel on fire when I pull away with a soft _smack_, but not long enough that he starts to respond.

I take my hands away and take the smallest step back, but close enough that I'm still standing practically on top of him.

"Just thought you should you. Since we're being all honest with each other about everything now." I say it bitterly. Immediately regret it. "Sorry. I should… Go. I should go."

He doesn't move away from the door.

"Romeo, I have no intentions of standing here and embarrassing myself further so if you could just -"

If it's the most cliche thing in the world to be kissed into silence, then I no longer have anything against cliches.

His hands grab the front of my jacket, now wet with the melted snow, pulling me closer to him than should be allowed. This one goes the opposite of how most kisses should: it starts off rough and angry and maybe with a little bit of sadness in there, too, then it gets soft and sweet and warm and everything that first kisses should be.

His lips open against mine when he cuts me off, his tongue meeting mine and, surprisingly tenderly, tasting my mouth with care as though he savors every bit of it. I forget what I was going to say, how I had planned on fixing things. Fixing things? What is there to fix if we're standing behind a closed door, in his house, kissing eagerly, his hands dragging my coat down and off, fingers trailing over my arms while my own hands find their way to his waist.

I pull him to me, away from the door - away from escape, for either of us, as I see it - and he leads me to the couch. It's the same couch as always, the one I've always loved. Neither my coat nor my shoes or socks make it there with us. Our noses keep bumping together and our teeth clash too many times to count, but neither of us really cares or notices too much to mind.

It's around the time we fall backwards onto the cushions that our kiss turns simpler, easier to manage. Our mouths close, and then we're just kissing, lips on lips. No teeth, no tongue - not too much, anyway - no hands wandering to strip us of the layers of clothing between us.

"God, I hate Mush," I say against his lips when I've gotten over the drowning sensation, and after I get over the initial shock of having said it out loud I have to get over the ragged, distant sound that my voice is.

"Don't hate Mush. Mush never did anything."

He latches us together again and pushes me backwards on the couch, so he's atop me and straddling my denim-clad hips.

"I thought you loved him."

I try to pull him down again when he backs up, rocks back and sits on his heels. Then he laughs.

"You thought I _what_? You really are dense, huh?"

I take a hand from where it pulls at his shoulders to point at the door. "I can walk right out there, mister."

He smirks. "You wouldn't." He plays with a curl that rests against my slightly sweat-dampened forehead (whether from the five-mile walk here or from Romeo, I'm not willing to bet) and his smirk turns into a smile. "I can't believe it actually worked."

"What worked?"

He leans over me again, rests his forearms on either side of my head. He's just inches away and it's the most goddamn sexy thing I have ever seen in my life.

"The plan. It was never Mush. God, _Mush_? Even if I did like him, I would never risk it with Blink, the scary-levels hyperenergetic bastard. The eye patch definitely just adds to that, he's like a fucking pirate… Right, okay. You really would never know a crush if it punched you in the nose. I asked Davey for help a while ago."

"How long a while ago?"

"A pretty long while ago. Like, the beginning of sophomore year kind of while ago. We set up this whole elaborate plan, but it never worked. So he eventually abandoned his morals and we agreed that desperate times call for desperate measures…" He kisses me again, moves his lips from my mouth to my jaw to my ear and his breath sends waterfalls of shivers down my spine. "... We had to make you jealous. That's what the whole Mush thing was about. But it was you, the whole time, and you never noticed. You brought it on yourself, Specs, you clueless boy."

I push him away gently and bury my head in my hands.

"I'm a proper clueless idiot."

He takes my wrists and puts them above my head, holds them there just tight enough to make them stay but just loose enough that I can move away if I want. I don't.

"Yeah, but you're _my_ proper clueless idiot now."

If we end up in his bed that night, back to chest and chest to back and arms wrapped tightly around each other with sleepy promises of never letting go, that's okay.

If we wake up the next day and it's Sunday afternoon, we realize, and we go downstairs and tell his parents and older sister and two younger brothers over breakfast, all of whom are happy for us - I think the younger ones might just be excited at the prospect of somebody in their house more often who knows how to make good pancakes - then that's okay, too.

And if we hold hands in school and kiss in public - Romeo always initiates it and I always come away blushing like mad, while he's grinning like a fool and I can't help but smile a little, too - then that's fine. Most everybody's happy for us, especially all the guys, and any harassment we might receive has to go through a whole army, almost, to get to us. Jack and Race and Itey and Dutchy have held back on the number of ass-kickings they've given for us, and with good reason. We scold them for it enough already without knowing about every one.

I remember a quote, a DR. Suess quote, and I'm not at all ashamed that I remember it (Romeo thinks it's adorable): "Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind." We both think it's perfect, and we kind of end up adopting it as our own little saying somewhere along the way.

We're happy now, together. We have our ups and downs, of course, as any couple does, but we stick it through, just like we always have. Romeo still comes and goes by Magnolia tree and Tigger becomes even more his dog, and we spent more nights than I'm sure our parents would approve in each other's bedrooms.

But that's okay. Because so what? It doesn't make any difference to anybody else. Just me and Romeo, and that's all that really matters.

_fin_


End file.
